Posts Tagged ‘Piranha Games’

Believe it or not, colossal 50-ton steel monstrosities that have to be careful they don’t accidentally crush poor, helpless rhinos aren’t nature’s most graceful creatures. They do not prance or saunter or gallivant or float from place to place as though held aloft by the wings of angels. They lumber. That is the thing that mechs do. As you might expect, this leads to a fair deal of complexity where movement is concerned. As MechWarrior Online developer Piranha says, it’s “kind of like piloting a giant walking tank.” And I concur, only replace “kind of” with “exactly.”

“Why walk when you can run?” I always ask. And why run when you can sprint? Any why sprint when you can suit up, clamber into a “light” 35-ton mech and mock the laws of physics at speeds of up to 118 km/h? These are all, of course, common philosophical questions that have echoed throughout classrooms and lecture halls for centuries. But the last one – perhaps the most common of all – is being made literal in MechWarrior Online. Dubbed the Jenner, this series standby is looking kind of incredible. And I’m pretty sure Piranha knows it.

It’s uncharacteristically warm in San Francisco today, so I think I – more so than just about anyone in the world – am best equipped to identify with giant robots. Specifically, MechWarrior Online‘s menagerie of metallic monoliths who’ve taken to duking it out on the newly revealed Caustic Valley map. It is, in case you hadn’t guessed, very, very warm. Mechs, meanwhile, tend to naturally become hot enough to spontaneously combust an egg on top of by way of, well, existing, so Caustic Valley requires extremely careful piloting. Otherwise, you’ll get all sweaty and nasty and gross and dead.

In case you were worried, MechWarrior Online does, in fact, have giant robots after all. I know, I know: I didn’t believe it either. Now, though, there’s honest-to-Godzilla-sized-robo-behemoth proof in the form of a fully automated video reel. Will wonders never cease? It introduces the well-rounded, generally reliable Centurion and details two specialized variants: one that’s best from a distance and another that loves nothing more than to move in close for its particular brand of rock ‘em sock ‘em robots. It can do this because it has 11 tons of armor. I did not know things could have that much armor. I imagine its hobbies include long walks on the beach, heavy metal music, and fashioning your home into a festive hat. So, with pleasant introductions out of the way, let’s see it in action.

It’s been ten years since the last MechWarrior game. Which seems odd, since the idea of stomping around in giant robots is such a popular one. But now the license has been put in the hands of Piranha Games, and it’s going online, and MechWarrior Online is going free to play. I saw it in action at GDC, so read on for my report.Read the rest of this entry »

Now that I’ve shoe-horned it into the headline, it’d be doubly embarassing if my mechognition skills were a bit off. I think you’ll find that the handsome chap below is an Atlas though, performing a hot drop in the first Mechwarrior Online video. It doesn’t actually show the game being played, that would be far too useful, so instead of discussing the finer points of the interface and damage modelling, we’ll have to spend our time dissecting the canonical correctitude of what we’re being shown. Ready?

Still no in-game images yet, but we’ve just learned that Mechwarrior Online will use CryEngine 3. “It is definitely the best choice for us,” said Russ Bullock, president of Piranha Games. “Both the character animation pipeline with the procedurally and physics based animations and the destruction system fit our goals perfectly and allow us to develop a truly unique AAA experience based on the award-winning BattleTech Universe.” Perhaps not too much of a surprise choice, either, given that Crysis mod. I also rather like the description of the “four pillars” of the game: “Mech Warfare, the embodiment of Mech to Mech combat. Role Warfare, the ability for player’s to customize their experience to suit their own style of gameplay. Community Warfare, the ability to let the players take part in epic combat for territorial control. Information Warfare, an element on the battlefield that incorporates information technology to help control the fight.” If they can nail all of those then it could be a fine, fine mech game.

It’s back after a seven year hiatus. IGN has the full scoop, and they report that developers Piranha Games have some ambitious plans, including 4-player co-op. They’re also going to try and make the full range of mechs significant within the game via recon and intelligence missions: “it’s not just a race to the heaviest, most powerful mechs. The designers want to reward you for picking a mech and sticking with it — you will gain experience and become better at piloting your chosen mech, and that will translate into better accuracy and damage with weapon systems. This way, a player could specialize in a light mech throughout the entire game if they choose. It also means there are multiple playthroughs with different mechs.” No release date as yet.